


living alive (until you're not)

by Dragonskye



Category: Big Hero 6 (2014)
Genre: Gen, Surgeons AU, genfic, mentioned Hiro Hamada/Marys Iosama, more like drabble + a fic about everything that happens before during and after, word vomit
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-07-27
Updated: 2015-09-12
Packaged: 2018-04-11 14:35:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 4
Words: 11,274
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4439321
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Dragonskye/pseuds/Dragonskye
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“Am I going to die?” Hiro whispers, and Tadashi chokes on tears instead of answering. /the grey’s anatomy hospital shooting au.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

 

It’s so stupid, Hiro thinks.

His vision is clouding and everything hurts and his heart stutters in his ears like the sputtering starts of the rust-bucket moped he drives to work every day.

He closes his eyes even for an instant and voices echo urgently in his ears, familiar voices though he can’t take the time to identify them right now, voices that tell him not to close his eyes, lie still, _Hiro, stay with us PLEASE_ -

He was just doing charts. He was just filling out medical records, status changes. This wasn’t supposed to happen.

No one expects to go to the freaking hospital and get _shot_.

Hiro wants to say he’s only twenty-one, that he still has his whole life ahead of him

(his whole life just got shortened to the space between the whipcrack and a speeding bullet)

but everything hurts too much to try.

Hiro raises trembling fingers to his belly. His fingers drag in something warm and fluid - his heartbeat jets unsteadily - before a larger hand seizes them, folds his hand in two of theirs.

Hiro blinks dizzily, focuses. His brother - _the doctor, the surgical fellow, the one who recommended this dumb internship in the first place_ \- swims into clarity, eyes wide and suspiciously shiny through the black spots blurring his vision. 

“Tadashi-“ he tries to say. His brother shushes him before more than a croak can pass his lips. “Don’t try to talk,” he says, voice shaking. “Everything’s going to be fine. You’re going to be fine. Okay?”

_-nothing is fine, he has a bullet in his gut, a shooter’s loose in the hospital and who knows what might be going on right now -_

_“_ Righ-t,” Hiro breathes, and smiles a little with pale lips. Tadashi forces one in return, even as he packs the entry wound with gauze and paper tissue and wipes the blood from Hiro’s cheek.

“The packing's not working. We need to get him to an OR, right now,” Tadashi says to someone Hiro can’t see, voice taut as a violin bowstring. Was there even someone else in here…?

Right. The patient, Matsuda-something. The one who was in for a routine surgery, the one who held still and played dead while the shooter paced about her room. While the shooter found _him_ and put a bullet through his stomach.

_Are you a surgeon?_

_Yes - Yes, sir-_

_What are you doing-!_

Stupid, stupid. He should have been smarter, he should have known. The shooter was looking for surgeons, was looking for targets. Hiro had just been unlucky enough to meet both criteria.

So Tadashi’s alright because he was smart enough to pass himself off as a nurse, and Hiro’s bleeding out on the floor because he was too dumb to say otherwise.

And Hiro’s

Hiro’s going to be fine, says Tadashi, as he presses burning pressure on Hiro’s belly and blood wells up beneath his fingertips.

\----

Tadashi has a plan.

They don’t know where the shooter is, whether he’s in the next room over or five floors up. They don’t have surgical tools or pressure bandages - he’s plugging Hiro’s gaping gunshot wound with _paper tissues_ , is this really happening -

But they do have themselves. They have a bedsheet that can double as a body litter, elevators thirty feet down the hall and the strength to drag him to the operating room themselves.

He has a plan. No one’s going to die today, if this works -

It _will_ work.

.

.

..

(It doesn’t.)

\----

Tadashi screams.

They’re enraged screams, heartbroken screams, screams to wake the living dead. Tadashi violently overturns the chairs in the waiting lounge and bangs his fists against the elevator doors because he -

They both know that this is over.

Tadashi draws a ragged breath, abruptly replaced by sobs that rack his whole body, He sinks to the floor, his back to them. Amelia Matsuda, the patient with the nervous tic and crazy grandmother, calls out to him tentatively. Hiro lets out a breath.

Tadashi’s out of ideas, because they can’t drag his makeshift litter up three flights of stairs to the operating rooms. They can’t take him up via the elevators because the lifts have been shut down - by police or Director Krei or a quick-thinking electrician, Hiro doesn’t know.

So they’re stuck down here.

Hiro blinks past the black smudges and turns his head the tiniest bit to watch his brother settle down next to him again, back to the wall, expression defeated. It still hurts.

Silence, broken only by Hiro’s stuttering breaths in the gap between heartbeats.

“Am…” Tadashi’s head jerks up, wide eyes focus on him - Hiro inhales and continues in a harsh whisper. “Am I going to die?”

He sees his brother’s eyes go even wider, sees Amelia cover her mouth to hide her dry sob.

Tadashi must have done this a thousand times - he’s a doctor, a surgeon. There had to be someone who hadn’t made it through a risky operation, or received a terminal diagnosis. Hiro’sbeen in that position plenty of times himself, and hey - he’s just a surgical intern.

Still, Tadashi’s throat works soundlessly, and for the first time his brother doesn’t seem to know what to say.

(He’s always known what to do, when Hiro came home with tear tracks down his cheeks and scraped knees from playground bullies, when he waved the internship application in Hiro’s face the summer after he graduated medical school)

“Yes,” Tadashi murmurs. “Yes, you are.”

So Hiro turns his face a little to the side - even that hurts - to stare blankly up at the ceiling.

( _hearing it out loud is a thousand times worse_ )

“Oh.”

His eyes prickle, and Hiro squeezes them closed, bites his lip. He doesn’t want to cry, and it’s so stupid because when else in this life is he going to get to it-?

He tugs fruitlessly at the oxygen mask over his mouth and nose - he doesn’t need it anymore, right? - and sees the blur of movement when Tadashi reaches over and removes it for him. Then he pulls Hiro’s head gently onto his lap, one hand cupping his cheek, the other threading through blood-matted hair. Hiro leans dully into the touch.

Tadashi’s voice is low and urgent in his ear. “But _don’t_ worry, Hiro,” he murmurs. “I don’t want you to be afraid.” He glances at Amelia, who quickly clasps Hiro’s bloodstained hand in both of hers. Her hands shake a little, but Hiro ignores it.

“We’re here - we’re here for you.” Tadashi says, combing his fingers shakily through Hiro’s messy locks. “And we’ll be here until…“

Hiro sees it when the façade shatters, when Tadashi realizes he can’t say it, can’t keep up the doctor’s spiel.

Or maybe that’s inaccurate. It’s the _who am I kidding_ moment _,_ the moment when Tadashi knows there’s nothing at all he can say to make this better. 

Tadashi’s voice hitches. Suddenly he’s clutching Hiro close, arms wrapped carefully around his torso, face buried in his shoulder. Hiro feels hot tears mix with crusted blood and privately thinks that probably heshould be the one weeping waterworks.

 _He’s_ the one dying, after all.

“I’m sorry,” Tadashi gasps. “I’m sorry I couldn’t protect you, I’m sorry I couldn’t keep my promise-“

“Tadashi-“

“Please don’t die, Hiro-“

“Tadashi!” Hiro wheezes. “It’s… it’s-“

It’s not okay. Nothing about this is okay.

“Stop,” he exhales instead.

He’d always thought about this possibility someday. Maybe he’d take the wrong road home, or contract some incurable genetic disease. Maybe he’d go the same way as their parents, die trying to save someone else.

He’s seen these things every day. He knows they happen, more often then people like to admit.

Just never to _him_.

The throbbing pain is such a persistent presence that Hiro almost misses it when it disappears, fading into a numbness that’s somehow more frightening than when his body was alive with agony. That’s a bad sign, right?

“Yeah,” Tadashi says, voice raw. “It is.”

So he’s waiting to die, and suddenly all Hiro can think about are the things he never got to say.

“Marys,” he says suddenly, hurriedly, wanting to get it out before nausea pushes it away. “I - I really liked her. But I never had the guts to tell her - tell her how I felt.”

“She knows, Hiro,” Amelia murmurs, a weak smile pulling at her face. “Girls always know.”

The corners of his chalky lips pull up a little. “You think so?” He smiles-

_(Marys Iosama is dead, she was the first casualty when the shooter stepped into the hospital. Gogo got a bullet to the chest and Marys got a bullet to the forehead-)_

_(-but Hiro doesn’t know that, and it doesn’t matter, because he’ll soon join her.)_

“Tell her I didn’t go out like a wimp, would you?” he mutters. Tadashi lets out a chuckle that sounds more like a sob. “Tell her - I was brave. A catch. She totally missed out.”

“You _are_ brave _,”_ Tadashi insists, voice unsteady. “Braver than I am, okay? I was the one who told the guy I was a _nurse_.” His voice turns acidic on the last word.

“More stupid,” Hiro mumbles. “’Shoulda told ‘im that, too. So much for being - genius, right?”

He’s thankful for all of them, actually. For Fred and Wasabi and Gogo and Honey Lemon, the first to make him feel like he belonged, who made the hospital feel like a second home. For Cass, who treated him like her own son.

And for Tadashi, who started it all. Who helped him every step of the way, who was always, always there for him.

He wants them all to know that, before he goes.

He’s thinking about that as the numbness turns warm, as the blank hospital ceiling blurs into kaleidoscopic clouds and swirling color.

He’s thinking about that as he drifts into a deeper, darker sleep than he ever thought possible.

He thinks about it as-

(….)

 

\----

(Tadashi cradles his brother’s body in his arms and cries)

 

 

 

 

 


	2. Chapter 2

 

**TWO HOURS PRIOR - San Fransokyo Grace Hospital, 9:37 a.m.**

 

“Hey, Gogo!”

Marys rounds the corner, clipboard in one hand, the other rummaging through plastic wrapped bags on the metal wire shelves. Gogo doesn’t look up from the shelves that she’s reorganizing, but she does hum a greeting. “Marys. What’s up?”

“Adam Grace’s having seizures,” Marys tosses distractedly over her shoulder. “Do you know where the antiepileptic medication is? His chart says I’m supposed to give him the topiramate and valproic acid, but…”

“Row B. Third shelf, three-quarters down.”

“Thanks,” Marys murmurs, and feels under the shelf. Her hand clenches on plastic, and she pulls one out, humming in satisfaction as she recognizes the label on the bag. Marys turns, ready to leave -

and comes face to face with a stranger.

He’s taller than her - almost six feet, actually. Bigger than Tadashi, but not as tall as Wasabi, with greying hair and hard blue eyes. The wrinkles in his face and the brown sweater vest he wears under the dark coat makes her think _college professor_ , but the air he gives off makes her hesitate.

“Excuse me, ma’am?”

“It’s _doctor_ ,” she corrects. “What?” Maybe she shouldn’t be so snappish, but Adam really needs his medication right now and this guy’s in the way.

“Do you know where I can find Director Krei?”

“Sorry, no idea,” Marys responds offhandedly, and makes to weave around him. He grabs her arm, jerking her a little _too_ close; Marys looks back with a glare that’s both irritation and reproach. Can’t he see she’s _busy-?_

“Can you tell me where to find his office?”

“Look, sir. Mr. Krei is a busy man, and I can’t help you right now. I’ve got a patient to attend to. Go find a nurse and ask _them_.”

If she’d looked, she would have seen the muscles in his jaw tense, his stance stiffen.

“Ma’am.”

“Sir, you shouldn’t even be back here. I’m not a tour guide, I’m a surgeon.“

She turns back when she hears the _click_ -

Marys looks down the ( _shiny, silver)_ barrel of a gun, and doesn’t even hear the _bang_

 

\----

 

but Gogo does.

It’s weird, because she was pretty sure all the heavy equipment was two rows over. And besides, they don’t make that sound when they fall-

( _Fred likes to joke that the noise is the jangle of the two grand in dimes the hospital will pay when they break)_

So she rounds the corner and sees a man she doesn’t know and no Marys. He’s standing over something light blue and shadowed by the comparative darkness of the storeroom.

Gogo wants to focus on reaming out the random stranger that _definitely isn’t supposed to be in here,_ but something about the shape behind him seems lumpy and unnatural.

“Who are you?” she asks curtly, leaning over to look - is that a shoe? - and

Oh. _Oh my god, Marys-_!

The man raises his hand. Gogo sees the black of the gun as it catches the light from the shuttered storeroom windows and staggers back, pivoting, her arm coming up instinctively to cover her face

She feels the point of blistering agony begin just under her left arm as something hot bright _painful_ punches through her side and lodges somewhere in her ribcage. The force of the impact throws her backwards; Gogo feels her head smack against the tile before the rest of her body follows.

And then she just lies there, heart thudding in her throat and a burning sensation spreading slowly outwards from her side - _that’s the dopamine working, the pain isn’t going to catch up to you for a while_

Footsteps, growing more and more distant until the door opens and the sounds merge with the clamor outside. He’s gone _(she hopes he’s gone)_ and Gogo sucks in a rattling breath - did it hit a lung? Does she have a pneumothorax?

Either way, she can’t stay here. She has to warn someone - get help, _something_ -

She presses one arm onto the entrance wound, flails out the other as best she can. Her arm lands in something wet and sticky, slips on the suddenly slick floor. Gogo can’t help the half snarl, half wheezing gasp that erupts through her throat. How is she supposed to get anywhere if she can’t even get up?

The elevator is five feet away. If she can _just_ -

She kicks weakly, claws her free hand against the floor. Inch by agonizing inch, Gogo drags herself towards the elevator, stopping every other second to inhale shakily. She’s probably leaving a massive ugly streak of blood behind her, but Gogo can’t find herself caring.

The button is _right there_. Gogo props herself against the wall and hammers a clenched fist against the pad. Down, up, it doesn’t matter. She just needs to get somewhere. She needs help.

Black spots tickle the edges of her vision when she finally pulls her legs into the spacious lift, curling them into her chest and

That’s it. She doesn’t have any more.

How useless can she be?

Her body burns - she can’t seem to get enough air, but every rise and fall of her chest only makes the foreign object in her side more painfully evident. Her limbs twitch and jerk spasmodically, and she’s shaking, probably suffering shock and extreme blood loss, maybe hemorrhage, hyperventilation -

Gogo tries to lift her head, feels the world spin and squeezes her eyes shut.

Her first thought: _I’m going to kill that bastard._

Her last:

 _What a stupid way to die_.

 

\----

(A nurse walks in fifteen minutes later and trips over Marys’s corpse.)

\----

“ _Shut up_ ,” Amelia Matsuda groans.

“I’m very sorry, ma’am,” Tadashi says, an expression of utmost sincerity on his face. “I’m truly sorry.”

“What do you _mean_ I can’t have my second surgery today?” Amelia flops her head back against her pillow. “Grandma, are you hearing this?”

“My ears work just fine, sweetheart.” Mrs. Matsuda responds dryly. “Let the doctor explain, would you?”

Tadashi gestures towards Hiro, standing off to the side with a clipboard under his arm. Unlike Tadashi, he’s not bothering to hide his grin. “Doctor Hamada?”

Hiro glances over the lab results. “Your hemoglobin and hematocrit - that’s the percentage of red blood cells in your blood - are extremely low. Your tank’s empty. You need a blood transfusion before we can operate.”

“…. Shut _up_ -”

“-Yes, ma’am,” Hiro snorts, ducking his head.

“Do you know how long I’ve been living with a colostomy bag? Do you? Do you really?” She glares around the room. “I have a bag of poop attached to my leg. It’s absolutely disgusting. Not to mention I’m _starving_ , since I’m not allowed to eat solid food for twenty-four hours before surgery.”

Her last comment is directed to Hiro. “I would eat _you_ if I could.”

“ _Well,_ ” Tadashi interrupts, smiling serenely. “Seeing as I can’t really have you eating my younger brother - he’s annoying, but I need _someone_ to do my paperwork - we’ll see if we can’t get rid of the poop bag tomorrow.”

Hiro squawks. Amelia’s eyes light up.

“And get you some food while we’re at it.”

“Really? Can I get pizza? Like that one kind from that one place, with the sausage and olives and ham and bacon?”

“ _If_ you’re ready for the bowel prep and enema that comes with it,” Tadashi says swiftly.

“ _Worth the pizza!_.” Amelia turns puppy eyes on her grandmother. “Please?”

Mrs. Matsuda cackles, getting up to affectionately ruffle her hair. “I think something could be arranged. Back in twenty, darlings.”

Tadashi heads out after her. Amelia stares after them for a couple seconds before cracking a shark-like grin.

“Does your brother have the hottest ass or what?”

Hiro’s pager beeps before he can go dry-heave in a corner.

\----

Tadashi glances down at his belt. His pager’s going off again, but it’s not the patient-in-distress beep. He’s never heard this one, before, actually.

“What’s going on?” he mutters. He balances the blood and urine bags in one hand and checks his pager with the other.

He frowns deeply at what he sees.

Tadashi turns to head back to the hospital room -

and promptly (nearly) runs into Hiro, who rounds the corner looking rather out of breath.

“Tadashi!” he pants. “Finally!”

“It’s been five minutes. Aren’t you supposed to be monitoring her IV line?”

“Done and done. Tadashi, I appreciate snark. I appreciate a sense of humor just as much as the next person, but she just keeps going on about your - your _stuff_ and some other stuff, and _wow_ , I am just so creeped out right now-”

“My _what_?“ Tadashi’s eyebrow shoots up. Hiro goes fluorescently crimson. “Hiro, have you even checked your pager?”

“No! I told you, I only just got away! I’ll do it right now, okay?” Hiro makes a big show of unclipping his pager from his belt and peering owlishly at its screen. Tadashi rolls his eyes.

“Code Black. Okay.” Hiro looks up. “What’s Code Black?”

“ _Hiro_.”

Hiro starts counting off his fingers. “I know a Code Red, Green, Blue… this is going to really bother me if I don’t figure this out. Tadashi?”

A pregnant pause.

“…You don’t know either, do you?”

“I may be a little uninformed,” Tadashi hedges.

“Your nerdhood is being threatened.”

“Look, bonehead. I’m seventy percent sure that it means lockdown. Honey and Wasabi pay more attention to this kind of stuff, honestly…”

Hiro shrugs, turning to head back down the hallway. Tadashi follows. “Well, great. Lockdown. Means we can’t leave the hospital, right? That’s fine. I never leave this place anyways.” Hiro's finger taps out a staccato beat on his other arm. “What do you think it is? A drill?”

“Hard to say.” Tadashi mutters. “You’d think they’d tell us these things in advance.”

“I’m calling it. Probably an escaped psych crazy. Or a _widdle ’lil_ _baby_ got out of the maternity ward.” Hiro adopts a high falsetto for emphasis.

Tadashi snickers in amusement, despite himself. “What about axe murderer?”

“I _love_ axe murderers!”

He listens to Hiro chortle and ignores the sick feeling in the pit of his stomach.

 

\----

“Code Black?”

Wasabi looks at his pager again. Shakes it a little. The message doesn’t change.

He’s memorized every word of the sixty-three-page rules book, and Code Black has exactly one line of text in a block of size nine font. It isn’t even _bolded._ Who the heck wrote that thing, anyways?

“Hey, do you know what’s going on?”

The question’s aimed at an attending doctor in front of him, who glances back distractedly. She looks like she’s in a hurry.

“Nothing good,” the attending says shortly, and quickens her pace. “Get to the lobby, nonessential hospital personnel are supposed to stay there for now!” she calls over her shoulder.

Wasabi shakes his head and follows. He can feel himself getting a headache from all this unnecessary stress, and that’s _bad_ , because stress shortens people’s lifespans, right?

(Wasabi really just wants to know what’s going on)

The third floor main lobby is more crowded than he expects it to be. There are nurses mingling at the front desk, hospital staff talking in corners and against walls. Wasabi pours himself a cup of coffee at the front desk and waves down the receptionist. Nurse Vivian, right?

“Do you know what this Code Black stuff is about?”

“All I know is that we’re on lockdown,” the older woman says matter-of-factly, stacking a pile of folders neatly on the counter. “People stay where they are. And at the moment, that’s right here.”

“And you’re sure that it’s not a drill? You’re very sure - one hundred percent sure, right?” Wasabi persists. He deflates a little when Vivian rolls her eyes, mouth opening for a disparaging comment -

Instead, her eyes fly to something just over his shoulder, and the woman starts forward.

“Sir, we’re on lockdown! You can’t go up there!”

Wasabi follows her gaze. There’s an older man in a black overcoat stepping over the barricade and climbing the stairs. Except the area’s closed, so he’s not allowed to do that. Except he’s turning around

_(a thread of recognition fires in Wasabi’s brain)_

The man raises his arm, and gunshots split the calm like water in bubbling oil.

Vivian collapses like a puppet with strings cut. Wasabi stares uncomprehendingly at the spray of red across his ( _pristine, new)_ scrubs for a moment

someone nearby shoves him to the ground, hissing an epithet in his ears. “Get down, idiot!”

More shots. Twice. Three times. People are screaming in earnest, now; Wasabi shields his head as he crawls behind the desk counter.

His breath catches in his throat. Vivian’s on the ground, eyes blank, and there’s too much blood for one body spilling out too thick too fast -

( _they learn how many pints the human body contains in medical school, of course, but it’s different, it’s different when it’s pooling under your fingertips and clogging your nails and rank in your nostrils)_

Wasabi has to force himself not to feel for a pulse. There’s nothing he can do for her. His fingers tangle in his hair instead and Wasabi swallows - _have to get out of here, have to leave_

His legs don’t want to move.

Wasabi can barely even think past the screaming and pounding of feet, the stampede of patients and hospital staff alike fighting to leave the area. A nurse nearly tramples him as he races past. Wasabi follows the movement past the elevators to the stairwell -

The elevators.

Wasabi scrabbles to stand up on shaky legs. He _runs_ , half bent over, half-expecting burning pain between his shoulder blades or torso at any moment.

He doesn’t feel pain. Instead, he feels the thud of his forehead against cool metal, the corner of the wall out of sight of the main stairway. Out of Cal- the _shooter’s_ line of sight. Wasabi desperately slams his palm against the buttons on the pad, waits frantically. Five seconds. Ten.

“ _Come on_!” he bellows, pounding on the doors. He can barely hear himself over the clamor.

They grate open. Wasabi practically dives forward.

He stutters to a stop.

His shoes stick where they touch the tile floor, and Wasabi flinches violently when his foot nudges against something _heavy_ and _fleshy_ and _alive_. He looks down haltingly, sees a streak of red wider than he is -

and Gogo, lying face-up in a pool of her own blood.

.

.

.

_(This is a nightmare, right?)_


	3. Chapter 3

Wasabi lurches forward, hands hovering over his friend. Gogo’s eyes are closed and her face is bone pale, he can’t even register the rise and fall of her chest -

He doesn’t know what to do. Oh god, he doesn’t know what to do. Feel for a heartbeat? Check the source of the bleeding? Should he start chest compressions?

_(Can he even touch her without injuring her more?)_

Wasabi fumbles for her limp wrist, nearly collapses in relief when he feels a pulse. It’s weak and fluttery and barely there, but she’s not dead. One of his best friends isn’t dead.

But if she doesn’t get medical attention soon, he realizes, she’s going to be.

Where can they go? Where can he possibly take her?

_Callaghan took the stairs up._

_Second floor has trauma supplies in the closet next to the elevators._

The lift drops, and Wasabi clutches Gogo’s hand like a lifeline.

**\----**

**San Fransokyo General Hospital, 9:56 a.m.**

The elevator doors open.

Fred grins - he didn’t even have to wait five minutes like he had last time he came here! - and just about bounces inside, mascot head jiggling behind him. Maybe he’s used to the weight, but Fred doesn’t want to be sweating up a storm if he can help it. To his surprise, the man already inside doesn’t step out. Maybe he came from the basement floor.

The guy’s medium height, with greying combed-back hair and kindly wrinkles. The man glances at him and blinks, probably because of the goofy mascot uniform. Fred gets that a lot.

The kids down in pediatrics like it, though, so hey. Worth.

Fred flashes a grin and smacks the button for the fourth floor. The one for the third is already blinking - must be where the other man is headed. The motors whir. The elevator starts to rise.

“Excuse me, sir.”

Fred glances over. “Sure. What’s up, man?”

“Could you tell me how to find the Director?”

Not ringing a bell… oh. “You mean Alistair Krei?” Fred says. “Heard he was coming up for a visit… one of the conference rooms, I think? Not sure which floor, though I think there’re a couple on each.”

The man doesn’t blink, or maybe he just does it while Fred isn’t looking. It’s a little creepy, to be honest.

“What about the Head of Surgery? I’ve been to her office before, but… I’ve gotten turned around. Seems like I’m just going in circles.” His tone is slow, measured, like he’s deliberating over each word before he speaks.

“Huh. Cass? She’s down in the East Wing.” Fred considers for a moment. “Near the labs, across the bridge.” He sees the man’s slightly furrowed brow and elaborates. “Follow the signs to the main lobby on third, up the stairs, past the pediatric wing and ICU units, and across the glass catwalk. You should find it, no problem!”

The doors open. The man steps out. Pauses. Looks back.

“Thank you.” And then: “Have a nice day.”

Big smile. Thumbs up. “You too!”

**\----**

“You paged?” Honey Lemon says, hurrying over to the hospital bed set up in the ER. The intern nods hastily and backs off to let her take over. There’s a little girl in the bed, with skin like melted chocolate and curly dark hair.

“Ruby Kendall, age nine,” the intern - Alex? - says, handing her the x-ray sheet.

“Appendix,” Honey murmurs. “Just let me feel your belly for a sec-“

The girl squeaks violently and jerks back when Honey’s fingers tap her stomach. Honey hastily withdraws her hand.

“Ouch. Okay, angry appendix. Very angry appendix.”

Honey checks the clipboard. “When’s her surgery scheduled?”

“As soon as possible. We’re just waiting for an OR now.”

“I’ll be scrubbing in, then, as soon as this… is over and done with.” Honey Lemon says.

(The patient’s right there, she doesn’t want to say anything about the _situation_ that might upset her)

The girl latches on to her arm as she goes to leave. “Is the surgery gonna - gonna hurt?” Her eyes are big and brown and fearful. Honey’s heart twists.

“Oh, sweetie. It’s not going to hurt. It’s the easiest surgery in the world, in fact. Ruby, _you-_ ” Honey Lemon pokes her nose. The girl smiles a little. “-will be out of here by tomorrow with a _very good_ excuse to have your parents feed you ice cream every night for the next week. How does that sound?”

Ruby giggles. “Good,” she says, voice barely audible. Honey beams, turns back to the intern.

“Keep her comfortable, alright? I have a couple of other patients to check up on…”

\---

Fred makes it onto the right floor without a problem. The corridors seem suspiciously empty, but Fred makes his way down to the pediatric unit, humming a happy tune and stamping his feet extra loudly to the beat.

Fortunately, things get much more active past the double doors. There are actual people, nurses and doctors pushing kids on trolley beds by. Fred maneuvers around one and passes by doors, counting off the numbers as he goes. E401, E402, E403-

He pulls open the door and saunters into the room. There’s kids in here, too - multiple kids, actually. Fred waves enthusiastically at the boy on the nearest bed, a kid with a shaved head and brown eyes, feels his spirits lift when the kid waves back. Jackpot!

Fred’s about to launch into his cheery hospital mascot visitor spiel when he spots the person pushing the bed, who glances up and freezes.

Double jackpot!

“Hey, Honey, what’s up?”

Honey Lemon looks at the kid on the bed. Looks at him. Looks back.

Then she flashes a brilliant smile at the boy, who’s looking between them rather confusedly, and parks his bed alongside another boy’s. “Tyler, Christian. Christian, Tyler. You both like gummy bears - discuss!”

Honey practically _runs_ out of the room, dragging Fred with her. As soon as the doors close, she rounds on him.

“ _What_ are you doing here?”

Fred laughs a little nervously, not entirely sure what she’s getting at. “Uh, visiting hospital inmates? Spreading love? You’re looking _really_ freaked out right now, what’s going on?”

“No, no. The hospital’s on lockdown, what are you _doing_ in here?”

“What- _lockdown_? Why?” He didn’t see anyone on his way up here, but…

“Yes, Fred, lockdown! There’s a situation in the hospital - I don’t know exactly what, but hospital staff stay with their patients, doors closed, _floor's_ closed, and _no one leaves or enters past the double doors_.”

“Oh - that. Ha.” Fred rubs the back of his neck sheepishly. “There wasn’t a guard or anything…”

Honey looks stricken. “Oh, who am I kidding…” She turns away, hands rising to her temples. Fred approaches hesitantly. He’s seen her stressed before - they’ve been friends since college, he’s been through the finals-week-ramen-noodles-all-nighter freakouts, the whole nine yards. But Honey looks like she’s about to pop an ulcer.

“… You alright?” he offers tentatively.

“No, I’m _not_!” Honey bursts out. “We’ve got nine nurses and four doctors on staff _including me_ and forty-two kids to look after. The boy in room twenty-eight needs his dose of ceftriaxone, asthmatic in thirty-five’s asking for his mom, forty won’t stop crying and - and - we’re just stretched way too thin. We can’t take care of everyone at once!”

Fred stares at her.

“… Oh.”

What can he say? Something helpful? Something encouraging? Both?

“Well.” Fred spiffs up his mascot suit - dusts off the lint on his lizard arms, straightens out the hood.

“So now you have nine nurses, four doctors, and one _awesome_ guy in a lizard suit!” he says. “Let’s get this idea thing going!”

He’s faced problems with delegating duties before - hey, Fred’s been volunteering since he was in middle school. Fred likes to think he’s encountered about every organizational issue there is.

He casts his gaze down the hall. Peers back through the side window into one of the rooms.

“What if you put them all into one room?”

“...Huh?”

“Like, one room.” Fred waves vaguely at the room next to them. “I did something like this with Brothers From Other Mothers. Well, not the same but sort of - I’m getting to it, sorry!” he adds hastily when he sees Honey’s face. “So the brass screwed up and rented about half the rooms we needed for some lunch event, so we had to squeeze everyone into just a couple. Must have been, what, fifty kids? It worked out even though we had to move some things around a bit, so… hey, Honey? Good? Bad?”

Honey Lemon’s nose scrunches up as she considers it. “… The play room. Fred, do you know where the play room is?”

He tries to remember. “The one with all the blocks and sick Marvel action figures and toy trains and stuff? It’s not gonna fit everyone with their beds unless we do some serious compressions…”

“Yeah,” Honey breathes. “But that - that could work. If we have wheelchairs, and stable kids walk… yeah, let’s do that!” She turns to rush down the hall. Spins back around.

“Fred, you’re a genius!” Honey flings his arms around him, does a little happy dance before she hurries off back down the corridor, calling out orders to nearby staff. Fred feels a dopey grin cross his face.

Hey, he doesn’t get that every day.

“I’m coming!”

Maybe his job isn’t cheering up patients today, but that doesn’t mean he can’t help.

.

…

.

(“ _Hey, Fred?”)_

_(“... Huh?”)_

_(“I hope the others aren’t having too much trouble…”)_

\----

Gogo groans as Wasabi sets her down on the conference table. He pulls on a pair of gloves even though his hands are already stained red - they’re shaking so much it’s actually kind of hard to get them over his wrists.

He grabbed everything he could think of as quickly as he could. It remains to be seen whether he can actually do anything with them.

“I - am,” she hisses, “ _so pissed off right now_.” There’s a wet gurgle somewhere in the back of her throat. Wasabi flinches so violently he nearly drops the bandages he’s fishing out.

“Gogo, calm down. You’ve been shot-”

Gogo doesn’t listen. Instead, she surges up from the table, grabbing onto Wasabi’s collar with startling strength and pulling his face an inch from hers.

“I'm gonna kick - his ass!” she snarls in his ear.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa!” he blurts, pushing her back down onto the table. “Gogo, _please_. Don’t move, I need to look at it!”

He’s a neurosurgeon. He never had Gogo’s quick thinking, Gogo’s ability to stay calm under pressure. _She’s_ the trauma surgeon, not him.

_(she’s also the strongest person he knows, and if Gogo’s like this he doesn’t want to think about Hiro and Tadashi and the others)_

“You’re going to be alright,“ he mutters. It’s okay. Wasabi’s been on the trauma team before, he got by - was never particularly good at it, but he got by - and he’s treated gunshot injuries before.

 _Check for an exit wound_.

Wasabi turns Gogo to the side as gently as he can, but a pained moan still rises in Gogo’s throat. He doesn’t have any anesthetic, and no time to wait for any to take effect anyways.

“Sorry, sorry!” he mutters. Lots of blood, but no wound on her back, meaning that-

-the bullet’s still in there somewhere. Wasabi wants to curse, and he _never_ curses. He’s going to have to wing this.

Muttering a quick apology, Wasabi unbuttons Gogo’s scrub shirt and folds it over her front to examine the wound site more closely.  

( _he ignores how her entire torso is slick with red)_

Sucking chest wound _possibly_ , so he has to start a chest tube. Wasabi’s the heavy lifter, the guy that gets called to move the heavy boxes because no one else has quite the brute strength. He’s grateful for the muscle now, because Gogo’s eyes bulge when he takes the tube out of the kit.

“No -“ she sputters, making to get up from the table. “No chest tubes, I’m _fine_ -“ She sucks in a wet-sounding breath. Wasabi’s heart seizes, and he shoves her back down with one arm across her shoulders, the other swabbing the area on her upper torso.

“Gogo, please!” He glances frantically from side to side - there isn’t anyone around, he’s checked. He needs to stay calm, he can do this on his own

( _there’s a reason they don’t let emotionally compromised doctors on the job; none of them were on duty while Tadashi was on the table for third-degree burns last summer)_

It’s different when it’s someone you know. It’s different when it’s your best friend.

How’s he supposed to stay calm when it’s _Gogo’s_ life on the line?

…

He has to. There’s no other option. There's no other choice.

(O _r, well, there is, but it involves a gun and a deranged killer-)_

Wasabi pushes the issue firmly from his mind.

“I’m making the incision, don’t move,” he mutters. Gogo’s glazed eyes flick to his. Wasabi squeezes her shoulder in what he hopes is a reassuring gesture.

And Gogo doesn’t move. Instead, she lets out a strangled scream, hands fisting helplessly against the wood of the table. Wasabi freezes. His eyes flick to the ceiling, and all he can think is _what if Callaghan hears what if he comes back_

He can’t stop.

“I know it hurts, Gogo, but you can’t make any noise!” he almost begs. Gogo’s scream dies down, only to erupt once again when Wasabi goes back to work. It hurts, he _knows_ it hurts, but he also knows that if Gogo doesn’t stop then the shooter’s going to come back and finish them off.

“I’m sorry!” he hisses, and stuffs a clean towel into Gogo’s mouth. Her shrieks die down to muffled moans as she bites down _hard_ on the cloth instead.

Wasabi leans back from the successfully inserted chest tube and breathes a shaky sigh of relief.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> more word vomit incoherent angst
> 
> just a warning, this is going to jump around a LOT in terms of character perspectives - for instance, fred's elevator episode takes place prior to the lobby shooting. I'll post a timeline when i get around to it.
> 
> also medical inaccuracies should be pointed out but not ragged on, because I'm getting my info from a medical soap and the internet


	4. Chapter 4

 

“What do you mean, you don’t know what to do?”

Alistair Krei flips through the hospital manual - it must be three hundred pages thick or more, with thick plastic-laminated pages and minuscule font. He runs his fingers down the page. There’s the list of codes, and Krei thumbs frantically down them. There has to be _something_ here that matches the situation-

“You’re the head of security. This is your _hospital_. I’m hiring the wrong people if you don’t even - look, I understand that nothing like this has happened before-“

A bolded phrase catches his eye. Krei nearly rips the page clean off rushing to read the tiny paragraph beneath it. “Found it. We’re on lockdown. Nobody moves in or out. Personnel stay where they are - Miss Phung, the pager.”

His assistant, a woman in a perfectly crisp suit, black-rimmed glasses and an impeccable bun, nods, enters a couple of commands on the master pager clipped to her belt. Next to her, the nurse that had discovered the dead intern stands there, still shaking like a leaf. Red soaks the front of her scrubs, but between the two of them, they had managed to get most of the blood off of her face and calm her down enough for her to give them the story.

There was a shooter in the hospital. There was a shooter, still _is_ a shooter, and someone - maybe more than one - is dead.

 _There was another stain, a really big one, further in,_ the woman had babbled. _There might have been someone else - I don’t know, I don’t_ know -

This feels like a nightmare.

Krei’s the owner of the hospital. He knows it’s his job to fix this, to help, but it’s so hard when he doesn’t even know what to do next.

Maybe his assistant sees his nervous sideways glances. In any case, she offers advice in a voice so stonily calm that he wonders how she fakes it. “Moving locations would be prudent,” she says, and Huyen glances pointedly at the transparent glass walls.

“Yes, yes,” he mutters, flustered. They’d be sitting ducks in here. “Is there a secure location?” He can’t recall whether any of these hospital rooms actually have locks on the doors. It’s so that the nurses and doctors can get around easier - the time it takes to unlock a door could be what saves a patient in cardiac arrest - but all Krei can think about is the fact that the faceless shooter can theoretically go wherever the hell he wants right now.

Nowhere in this hospital is safe.

A curt shake of Huyen’s head confirms Krei’s worries.

“One of the storage rooms. It’s better if we’re in the open as little as possible.”

Krei nods. Hospital policy - everyone stays out of sight.

But, well, he’s the director. Shouldn’t he be moving around? Spreading word? Making sure everyone’s safe?

Krei turns his attention to the nurse, who looks back at him with those too-big too-scared eyes. “Excuse me, miss,” he starts. “I understand you have patients down the hall?” She stares back, eyes wide and unseeing and the size of full moons.

“Miss,” he tries again, putting a hand on her shoulder - only to jerk it back as she flinches violently away. But at the very least, he’s shaken her out of her stupor. The nurse nods her head back and forth. “Oh. Um. Yes. Yes, I do.”

Krei breathes, slowly, through his nostrils. Calm. “Alright. You should go back to your station. Change clothes, take care of your patients. Is that right?”

“Yeah,” the woman stutters. Her hands are still shaking when she stumbles to the door. She freezes with a hand on the knob and looks back. “Wait- What about you, Mr. Krei?”

He could hide. The other board members had already been quietly escorted to a more secure location by security detail. Krei isn’t a doctor, or even essential hospital personnel. He’s a civilian, technically. He doesn’t have to stay. And no one would blame him for finding a safe place, right?

 _Two people might be dead,_ a voice persists _. How many more?_

_What if you can make a difference?_

Krei knows he’s made some bad judgments in the past, and maybe more than one person has paid for his mistakes. He doesn’t want that on his conscience _._ Maybe he wants to make amends.

_(and isn’t this what she would have wanted?)_

“This is my hospital,” he says, and he hopes no one notices the shaking in his voice. “I will remain here. Thank you for your concern.”

The nurse looks like she wants to protest. Instead, she bobs her head hesitantly, turns to grope for the door. It opens, thuds shut. Hurried footsteps recede down the hallway. When Krei looks at Huyen, his assistant nods back but doesn’t move to follow.

So she’s staying.

Maybe that should be a relief. Maybe he should be glad that he doesn’t have to face this on his own. But as the glass door slides open and closed and the patter of footsteps fades down the hall, all Krei feels is dread.

What had he gotten himself into?

           

\----

Cass is on her coffee break when the police cars speed past.

            It’s a nice place - a little café just off Union Avenue. Sure, the commute’s a little long, but a twenty-minute round trip is _definitely_ worth the donuts and coffee they serve. Plus, it’s not like she’s in a hurry. She can stay and relax for a while. A third chocolate donut wouldn’t be overdoing it, right?

Maybe she’s a surgeon, but her heart jumps a little when she thinks of working in - _owning -_ a café like this. Making her own pastries, talking to patrons, running an independent business. Maybe when she retires.

Or maybe she’ll take her funds and buy a mansion on the west side of town. That works, too.

Though at the rate it’s going, her nephews might save up enough first. Hiro and Tadashi have always been going on about thanking her for all she’s done for them. Last year it was an embellished photo album and a family vacation to Malibu. The year before that it was breakfast in bed and that homemade parenting book (filled with stuff that she already does, like make them hot wings and put up with all their teenage shenanigans). It’s stupid and silly. Cass could hug them as tight as she could and tell them that having them is more than enough.

She’s a surgeon, anyways. She’s fine with her clinical research grant and nigh-impossible surgeries. Vacations are something she can do without.

So Cass hears the shrill screech first, and then the flashing lights in the corner of her vision as cars scramble to pull over. Traffic stops as two - no, three - squad cars jet through the intersection. Two ambulances follow after. Cass frowns.  Ambulances mean incoming traumas, and the SF Hospital’s the foremost trauma center in the city. They might need her. 

But then again, SF is one of the best medical centers in the country, with the rankings and surgeons to prove it, and wow, she’s already reaching for her pager look at that-

Her hand closes over nothing.

Cass frowns. She digs around in the pocket of her jeans, and then checks the other one. She goes for her purse. It takes a minute to dig through the various paraphernalia in there. Still nothing.

Ugh, she must have left it in her car. Which is across the parking lot.

… _Ugh._

She might as well just drive back at this rate. What if they actually do need her? The thought won’t leave her mind, prickly as it is. Cass sighs, puts her book and the remnants of her donut away and picks up her coffee. It’s fairly obvious she’s not going to get any more peace and quiet.

Back to the hospital it is.

On her way back, she pulls over for three more ambulances and a squadron of police cars, even a fire truck. Big accident then, Cass thinks absently. The ambulances definitely have more traumas, and police probably have to make a report.

_But why so many?_

She knows it’s nothing. It’s probably nothing, but she’s jittery for the rest of the drive. It’s hard to concentrate on the road, and after four minutes of waiting at a red light Cass seriously contemplates running the intersection. It’s not until she hears sirens in the distance that her heart really sinks rock-bottom.

Oh, no.

The police cars, the fire truck, the ambulances, they’re all crowded in the plaza in front of the hospital in droves of flashing lights and flagrant disregard for marked parking spaces. Police officers form a perimeter with their cars, and more of them have guns - are those _assault rifles_? - trained on the hospital doors and windows.

There’s a crowd of pedestrians outside the line, craning their necks to see what’s going on, and Cass hurriedly parks her car across two (handicapped) parking spaces and almost forgets to lock the doors as she half-runs to the back end of the crowd, twenty or thirty feet away from where the police perimeter is set up.

“What’s going on?” she demands of the nearest bystander, but receives only a shake of the head in response. Cass nearly snarls at him before she turns away.

Is there a terrorist threat? A bomb threat like that idiot with the homemade cannon last year? Cass can’t help but wonder what kind of danger necessitates a near army of police officers and paramedics on standby in front.

Why was no one going inside?

It takes what seems like forever to push and shove her way to the front of the crowd, right up to the line of police officers that mark the perimeter. Cass ducks past a gap in the line and strides right through, up until a hand on her shoulder stops her approach.

Cass shrugs it off. The police officer maneuvers in front of her, holding up his hands like he thinks it’s going to stop her from going any further. He looks like a middle-aged man, with a sagging face and thick brows drawn tight in worry. “Ma’am-“

“What’s going on here?” she demands again, almost shouting to be heard over the noise. She wants answers, and she wants them _now_.

“Ma’am, please stand back. We’ve cordoned off this area.”

Cass grits her teeth. A part of her wants to unload her built up temper on this guy, but a larger part wants information. “Don’t give me that. My name is Cass Hamada. I’m the Chief of Surgery at this hospital. My people are in there. Tell me the situation!” she practically snarls. “… Sergeant Gerson,” Cass adds belatedly, noticing the bronze-plated badge on his lapel.

The sergeant hesitates. Cass can see him weighing what to tell her. She wants to grab him and shake him violently by the collar, except that might be vaguely illegal.

Cass isn’t expecting what comes next, though.

“There’s a shooter in the hospital,” Sergeant Gerson says. “He took down one of the doctors. And… well. We’re not sure whether or not he’s still inside.”

The words don’t register for a second.

A shooter…?

No, it can’t be. There must be a mistake.

Her nephews are in there. Her coworkers, her friends, her fellow surgeons. They’re all in there, and she’s-

She’s stuck out _here._

The police officer intercepts her when she tries to duck past him.

 _“_ No no no, ma’am!” The police officer, apparently having predicted her response, blocks her path when Cass tries to circumvent him the other way. “No one in, no one out.”

“Are you evacuating people, then?” Cass demands, her voice audibly higher-pitched than normal. “You better be getting them out of here, because-“

“Standard procedure is lockdown. Until we know who the shooter is and where he is, everyone stays in the same place. It’s for their own safety.”

Cass feels her brows draw closer together. Her face seems permanently frozen in a stony scowl. “I don’t think you understand. This is my hospital. My people, my responsibility. You have to let me through.”

“My team has this,” Sergeant Gerson cuts her off. “SWAT team’s on the way. I’m sorry, ma’am, but it’s going to be fine. They’re going to take care of this.”

He finally lowers his hands. Meets her eyes. “Okay?”

Cass stares at him, her mind whirling. There’s a shooter in the hospital. Her nephews, her friends, they’re all in there. She can’t sit by and do nothing, but that’s exactly what he’s telling her to do. 

He’s telling her that there’s nothing she can do, and she has no choice but to believe it. What chance does she stand against a maniac with a gun?

“Okay,” she breathes, defeated. Sergeant Gerson nods in quiet understanding, walks away to confer with the younger officer tinkering with the machinery set up at the foldable table.

Cass just stares at the hospital building, looming over them. It looks so… so normal. If it wasn’t for the screaming sirens and the gathering crowd and the police, she might have believed it was just another day at work.

How had it gone so wrong?

“Cassandra!”

“Miranda?”

She knows Miranda Matsuda. The two of them were old friends in college, despite the age difference, and reconnected years later after a chance meeting at the hospital. She’d always liked the older woman for her dry humor and occasional beats of sage wisdom. But the woman looks completely lost now as she scans the emergency vehicles blockading the plaza.

“I step out for fifteen minutes… Cass, what’s happening here?”

A SWAT truck pulls into the lot beside them, and passersby and police alike part to let it pass. It’s painted black and silver. People in dark uniforms armed to the teeth hold onto handholds built into the sides. They’re finally here.

That’s when Cass makes her decision.

She’ll stand by for now. Sergeant Gerson’s right - the police are far more qualified than she is to deal with these kinds of emergencies. But when they get more information, when she sees an opening-

Cass _is_ getting in there. The question is how legal her approach will be.  

 

\----

 

These lab results are taking forever.

Hiro taps his foot impatiently, staring at the computer screen. Refreshes it. Refreshes it again. They’re just a bunch of blood tests, what’s with the wait?

If anything, the entire floor seems quiet - more quiet than usual, that is. There are still people manning the stations and nurses moving in and out of rooms, seeing as they still have patients to take care of, lockdown or not. Tadashi left to go take care of the patient with a reminder to meet him back at the room as soon as possible. There’s an air of unease that Hiro can’t quite shake.

Code Black might be more serious than he’d previously thought.

Except if that were the case, why hadn’t he even heard of it before? It hadn’t come up in his hospital orientation. Actual drills at the hospital were few and far between, and for good reason. Why bring hospital routine to a standstill when there was no real need to do so? There hadn’t even been one since Hiro had started working here.

Hiro shakes his head irritably. He’s overthinking this. The lab results are taking forever because the third-floor technicians have snuck out for an illegitimate coffee break. Or maybe the computer’s disconnected from the hospital network. It’s an outdated piece of junk. Hiro could throw something together ten times better in half the time it’d take to fix it.

Labs aren’t that far off. He can go pick them up manually, right? Nothing like a throwback to the Stone Ages.

He tucks his clipboard under his arm and ducks around the counter, heading for the elevators. He’s halfway down the hallway when someone screams.

Hiro runs to the corner and looks around it - only to jerk back against the wall as something drills a tiny hole in the wall across the hallway.

Was that a -

The gun goes off again. Despite his instincts screaming at him, Hiro ducks and risks another peek around the corner. He sees red spots on the wall, on the floor, before he ducks back around and presses himself flat against the wall.

His legs suddenly feel like wet clay, and Hiro sinks slowly to the floor. Something in his mind shorts out like an overtaxed circuit.

Or maybe it doesn’t. Maybe it makes the single, horrifying connection that now bounces around Hiro’s brain on hellfire repeat.

Not an axe murderer, Hiro thinks half-hysterically. Shooter.

Oh, god. A shooter. In the _hospital._

His legs finally unfreeze. Hiro stumbles when he tries to stand up, catches himself on a wheeled cart and pushes off of it _._ The corner nails his ribs. Hiro barely feels it.

He’d be surprised if anyone missed the shouts and yells going on near the elevators, but he doesn’t count on doctors and nurses or the more mobile patients exiting their rooms to investigate the commotion.

Hiro manhandles a middle-aged patient back inside a room and shouts something half-unintelligible at the receptionist peering over his station across the hallway. He sees the man’s eyes widen in shock and knows that he’s gotten at least part of the point across before the man ducks inside another room. The door slams shut, but that’s not much of a comfort when none of the doors in this hospital lock on their own.

A gunshot rings out behind him, and the screams multiply. Hiro feels sick to his stomach - even more so when an awful thought occurs to him.

His brother’s in his room right now with the patient - neither of them know what’s going on. He has to warn Tadashi.

Hiro crosses the hall at a dead run and barrels into the room. His brother’s already looking towards the door, but the confusion turns to shock when Hiro slams the door shut behind him and leans on it like doing it might stop anyone else from coming inside.

“Hiro, what’s happening out there?”

“Shooter,” Hiro blurts, chest heaving. “Tadashi, the shooter’s on this floor.”

“ _What?_ There’s a-“

“ _Oh my god_.” And that’s Amelia Matsuda, sitting up on the hospital bed. He can already see Tadashi’s mouth opening to demand an explanation. Hiro doesn’t have one to offer.

He doesn’t have to, anyways, because they all hear the second set of gunshots.

Tadashi rushes to the window. There are nurses and doctors running down the hallway past the main desk, past their room to the stairs or the elevators on the other side. A man in the security guard uniform backs away, hands up, nearly tripping over the similarly garbed form on the ground behind him. Someone else wearing a dark coat approaches him at a steady gait. There’s no mistaking the object in his hand.

It’s muffled, but the voices are still audible, and Hiro can’t seem to tear his eyes away.

“ _Please, sir. I- I have a family-!”_

Hiro stumbles away from the door as the shot rings out, shoving down the urge to retch. He shares a single terrified glance with his older brother - and then Tadashi crosses the room to Amelia’s bedside. His fingers work feverishly at the drips attached to the IV stand. 

“Hiro, lower the frame.”

“On it!”

Hiro vaults over the bed to the other side, slapping the button with probably more force than necessary. Amelia tries to sit up as the mattress falls fully horizontal. Tadashi shoves her back down. “What’s happening?”

“Play dead,” his brother hisses. “Do not move. Do not breathe. Hiro, hide!” The last order is snapped over his shoulder. Hiro freezes.

“What about you?”

“Just do it!”

Tadashi inhales deeply, puffing out his cheeks in exaggeration. Hiro sees Amelia copy him as Tadashi yanks the sheets up over Amelia’s head, tucking them in with fast, efficient movements.

And then Hiro jerks open the _tiny, tiny_ supply closet and ducks inside, trying not to let his head bang on any of the shelves or cleaning supplies or medicinal backup items as he scrambles for a comfortable place to sit. There’s almost no space at all, and no time at all to get acclimated.

He hears the scuffle of feet and limbs outside his closet, and the tiny _click_ of the hospital room door opening.

 

\----

 

_“Dr. Hamada, that’s the fifth time you’ve checked your pager.” Tadashi shifts guiltily, resisting the urge to hide the device. She rolls her eyes at him._

_“Oh. Don’t worry about it. It’s hospital policy. Bad habit - uh, I mean, good. Good habit. ”_

_A sigh. “Dr. H. My grandmother’s late. She’s never late. Plus, you’ve been kind of hanging out with me for the past, what, twenty minutes?”_

_She props herself up on her elbows to level a flat stare at him. “I mean, I’m not complaining. Looks sketchy, though.”_

_Is he that transparent?_

_A pause. “Is there a problem?”_

_Tadashi shifts uncomfortably. He doesn’t want to say anything - first rule of conduct, make sure the patient remains comfortable - but he doesn’t want to lie, either._

_He compromises. “There may be a… situation. I’m not fully aware of the details yet.”_

_He sees Amelia’s eyebrows draw together in a frown and shakes his head. “I’m sure it’s nothing to be concerned about. Hospital procedure dictates-”_

_Tadashi never gets to tell her what hospital procedure dictates, because both of them hear the distant yelling outside the door of the room. Instead, Tadashi turns, eyes fixed on the sliver of the hallway he can see beyond the window-_

_-his younger brother rams the door open, eyes dilated and chest heaving for breath._

_Shooter,_ Tadashi thinks, and his heart thuds brokenly when the door to their room eases shut with more care than Tadashi would have expected from a mass murderer.

The man moves away from the door, stepping towards the bed in a half-prowl. Tadashi leans forward as far as he can, fighting the urge to draw his legs in. He barely fits under the bed as it is. He wills the man not to look too closely at the floor.

 _There’s no one here_. _Just go._

Instead, he sees the man lean forward and, in one hard movement, yank back the sheets on the bed.

Silence. Tadashi closes his eyes and prays to whatever gods are out there that Amelia Matsuda has the presence of mind not to move. Or blink. Or breathe.

Nothing happens, but the man jerks back like he’s been burned, and the quiet “ _Oh_ , _no,”_ he emits freezes Tadashi’s blood in his veins.

His voice is deep and rough, punctuated by ragged breaths. Tadashi presses a hand to his mouth to swallow the gasp, because he knows without a doubt who that voice belongs to.

Robert Callaghan backs away from the bed to pace back and forth at the front of the room. “This is too much. I didn’t- I can’t-“

Tadashi’s mind whirls with questions. Callaghan’s the shooter. His _teacher_ came to the hospital with the weight of a failed lawsuit and a handgun in baggage.

His old professor pulled the trigger on that security guard, _all those people_ , and even dizzy from holding his breath and sick with fear, Tadashi takes a moment to ponder exactly how much Callaghan has changed to condone that kind of action.

People change a lot in the span of a summer and a half year, it seems.

_If Abigail was here…_

The sudden absence of footsteps sends his heartbeat skyrocketing. Tadashi feels his heart drop like a rock when he hears an almost inaudible rattling in the supply closet.

It might have been a twitch that shook a loose shelf. Cleaning equipment momentarily moving, or cleaning items being bumped aside.

It doesn’t matter. What matters are the footsteps rapidly approaching the closet door. Tadashi’s heart seizes in his chest, and suddenly all the air in the world isn’t enough to relieve the choking sensation in his lungs.

_No. No, no, no._

_Not him._

_Please!_

Everything seems to move in slow motion. The noise of the door as it opens. The sound of Hiro stumbling to his feet-

The cold, biting tones of his former teacher’s voice. 

“Are you a surgeon?”  
Hiro’s never met Callaghan, Tadashi thinks wildly. He doesn’t know if his brother would recognize him, because all that time Tadashi was in the hospital last summer and news media covered the accident, Hiro had alternately spent his time at Tadashi’s bedside and locked up in his room.

To Callaghan, Hiro must be just another faceless target.

Hiro’s voice shakes when he answers. “Y-Yeah. Yes, sir.” A pause. Tadashi lies in petrified silence below the bed, but his heart stutters painfully against his ribs when he hears Hiro’s terrified intake of breath. “No. Wait-!”

The _crack_ of the gunshot doesn’t penetrate Tadashi’s mind. What does is the _thud_ when Hiro collapses onto the narrow strip of floor directly adjacent to the bed. When Tadashi gets a close up view of his brother seizing on the tile, hands struggling towards the red blooming over his stomach. He’s less than three feet away when Hiro heaves a stuttering gasp and locks glassy eyes with his.

Everything else happens far, far too fast.

Tadashi can’t stop the whimper that hisses out past the hand clamped firmly over his mouth. But he does see the shooter pause. Tadashi imagines his head turning to pinpoint the sound, and sick fear wells up in his throat.

The shooter moves to the foot of the bed. Tadashi freezes for a moment, and then someone’s seized hold of his feet, dragging him out from his hiding place even as he’s shocked into struggling to break free. 

Tadashi’s eyes focus enough for him to see the man’s expression slacken into shock, and his heart plummets to his stomach.

The voice. The clothing. They’re far, far too familiar, and maybe Tadashi could have pretended blissful ignorance before, pretended he didn’t know the person rampaging through their hospital. But he recognizes his mentor’s face through a field of vision blurred with panic, and it’s like his worst nightmares are simultaneously coming to life.

Suddenly, the burn scars crawling up his torso start to ache all over again.

“… Tadashi,” Callaghan says, his eyes wider than the gun barrel pointed straight at Tadashi’s face.  

“P-“ Tadashi stumbles on the word, his voice hitching. “Professor.” He can’t seem to think of anything else to say, and in any case his filter is completely shot. He can’t stop his hands from shaking, and somehow he can’t stop _talking_ even though he knows this is a really bad idea-

“You shot -“ he stammers. “You shot _Hiro_ , you-” He breaks off as Callaghan’s visage darkens, and the man’s hands clench on his gun. Something like a cold vise closes around his throat. The room seems to have taken on a surreal quality, grayed out around the edges and colors muted and blurred. This doesn’t feel real at all. Tadashi wonders whether he’ll wake up in a moment to that dumb toaster alarm slapping him in the face with a piece of bread and Hiro’s raucous laughter across the room.

He knows better. This is real. Callaghan is real, and Hiro is real, and the cold metal hovering two inches from his face is going to end his life. Months in the hospital. Months more of recovery, and this is how it ends.

Tadashi could laugh at the irony that _Callaghan’s_ the one doing the job, if he wasn’t so terrified.

“It’s what he deserved!” Callaghan’s voice rises unsteadily, his eyes slitted and darker than Tadashi’s ever seen them. “The surgeons at this hospital - you _people_ -” Callaghan closes his eyes for a moment. When they open again, they’re filled with deadly intent.

“Someone needs to pay.”

Callaghan’s fingers tighten on the trigger. Tadashi squeezes his eyes shut.

\----

…

_(He can’t do it.)_

\----

The _snick_ of the cartridge being replaced jars straight past the panic and heartbreak and fear.

Tadashi’s eyes flash open, and they wordlessly follow the path of the gun as Callaghan slowly, slowly, lowers it. The gun disappears into the confines of his coat, and the older man backs up, his eyes grazing Tadashi’s before he looks away.

“I-”

The man pauses, as if lost for words. Tadashi thinks he sees something like vulnerability in the lines of Callaghan’s face, but it disappears so quickly he chalks it up to illusion. The man’s features harden into grim stone.

“I… apologize. For the trouble.”                    

Tadashi doesn’t move at all as Callaghan steps away, as the door swings quietly open. He doesn’t think he can. Trying to think feels like wading through an ocean of sludge, like he’s experienced so much unadulterated terror in the span of so short a time that his mind’s shut down to try to cope.

The door closes with a too-loud thud. Barely a moment later, the sheets on the bed move. Amelia Matsuda heaves a shuddering breath, blinks open teary eyes. Her dry sobs fill the hospital room.

Tadashi just stares dully up at the pale ceiling, the sounds of harsh breathing reverberating in his ears.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> yeah, this is the part where the au diverges from the oneshot i had originally planned. i might go back and change it (or just remove the oneshot altogether) but that's for when i have a lot more time on my hands

**Author's Note:**

> word vomit angst, ha  
> Now for the rest of the nerd herd, can't leave them out where the sun shines


End file.
